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Different rings but both were champions

By Peter Lucas

Updated:
09/28/2012 10:00:54 AM EDT

This is a tale of two fighters, both champions.

One is Rocky Marciano, the late iconic heavyweight champion of the world, who was honored with a huge statue the size of his heart at a ceremony at Champions Park in his hometown of Brockton on Sunday.

The other is former Attorney General Frank Bellotti -- very much alive -- who coincidentally was honored in his hometown of Quincy the same day when the district courthouse in his town was named in his honor.

Both came from nowhere to dominate their professions -- prize fighting and politics -- and both went out at the top of their game, Marciano retiring in 1956 after 49 undefeated fights, including six in defense of his heavyweight title, and Bellotti in 1987 after three successful terms as attorney general.

Both men served as an inspiration to thousands of younger people, many of whom showed up to pay their respects at ceremonies in Brockton and in Quincy on a spectacular early fall New England day.

And while Bellotti may have attracted such distinguished guests as former associate U.S. Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter, as well as countless other judges, lawyers and politicians, the Marciano dedication drew not only thousands of regular Brockton residents, but the elite from the fight game, including former heavyweight champion Larry Holmes, boxing promoter Don King and a score of former fighters.

It is easy to see why the public is attracted to the two men and their life stories.

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The two came from the bottom and fought their way to the top, and when they got there they both reached down to help others less fortunate than they. They both established dignified styles of leadership, holding their professions -- law and boxing -- in high esteem, often putting their professions above themselves.

Both men were born into Italian-American immigrant families within five months of each other in 1923, and both sought to better their blue-collar lives by aspiring to rise from menial jobs to success in their chosen professions, boxing, politics and the law.

Bellotti is 89, the same age as Marciano would have been had he not been killed in a small-plane crash in an Iowa cornfield on his way to a speaking engagement on Aug. 31, 1969.

Marciano and Bellotti both served their country overseas in World War II, Marciano in the U.S. Army and Bellotti as a U.S. Navy frogman.

Bellotti tried his first cases as a lawyer in 1953 in the same Quincy court that is now named after him. Those trials came during the same year that Marciano beat Jersey Joe Walcott for the second time to retain the heavyweight title that he wrested from Walcott a year earlier. That earlier meeting was the fight where Marciano came up with the famous right-handed punch that sent Walcott to the canvas in the 13th round and made Marciano the champion. It is the punch that is duplicated in the statue.

Neither man traveled an easy toad to the top. Early in his career, Marciano fought in every tank town on the East Coast, sometimes fighting once a week, or once every two weeks, winning all of his fights, mostly by knockouts, before he hit the big time and took on Joe Louis, Roland LaStarza, Walcott, Ezzard Charles and Archie Moore.

Bellotti took criminal cases in every court in the state before he was elected lieutenant governor in 1962. He then beat incumbent Gov. Endicott Peabody in the 1964 Democrat primary for governor, only to lose the election to Republican Gov. John Volpe.

Bellotti may have been down, but he was not out. He ran for attorney general in 1966 and lost. He ran for governor in 1970 and lost again, making it three losses in a row.

He joked back then: "I'm told that losing builds character. If so, then I've got a hell of a lot of character."

Then, running again in 1974, Bellotti was elected attorney general. He shocked the Beacon Hill establishment by moving the office out of the Statehouse and proceeded to transform the office from the old boy political hangout it was to the highly professional law office it is today.

After serving three four-year terms, Bellotti declined to seek easy re-election to a fourth, and walked away on top in 1987. Unlike Rocky, though, a restless Bellotti tried a comeback in 1990, when he ran for governor. It was a fight too far. He lost the race but not his spirit. Like Rocky, he survived, he persevered, and he excelled.

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